Polish-American from Chicago Presents $25,000 Gift to the Museum of the History of Polish Jews

Mr. Stephen Kusmierczak, a Polish-American fund manager in Chicago, has donated $25,000 to the Museum of the History of Polish Jews to honor his late father Stephen and his mother, Elizabeth Ann, who lives in Illinois. He does so also to honor a Jewish family, the Schermers, who helped his father’s family when they first immigrated to America in the early 1900s—just in time to escape the devastation of World War I in Europe.

In a letter to Sigmund Rolat, Chairman of the North American Council for the Museum of the History of Polish Jews, Mr. Kusmierczak described how his grandparents died soon after their arrival, leaving Stephen’s father and his five siblings alone in the world. There were several Jewish families in a town near St. Louis who reached out to them, among them the Schermers, who sold the children shoes on a payment plan.

Stephen Sr. told his son that when he and his older brother would attempt to make their shoe payments, the Schermers would refuse, telling them that the shoes were already paid for. Stephen’s brother would insist that the payments had not been made, but the “stubborn” Schermers would not take their money. “Years later my dad realized what had happened. His proud brother would accept no handouts, which the Schermers also understood.”

He added, “My dad never forgot the kindness of this Jewish family, and shopped at their now closed grocery and later [their] garden store way beyond their prime years—a frequent point of contention between my parents!”

Years later, in the 1990s, Mr. Kusmierczak worked and studied in Poland for more than four years. He was surprised to discover that seemingly well-educated Poles knew little about the Jewish legacy in Poland and shocked when he encountered occasional expressions of anti-Semitism in a country with so few Jews. At the same time, he met many young Israeli and American Jews who came to visit the former Nazi concentration camps in Poland, and was surprised that they knew very little about the 1,000 year Jewish history in Poland.

“For them, Poland was the site of the Holocaust, the graveyard of their ancestors. There seemed to be little attempt to teach the other important part of the story—how the Jews lived and prospered in Poland for centuries. The phenomenally rich history of the Jewish people in Poland, and their vital contributions to the arts, learning, medicine and trade in their European homeland, were largely ignored.”

His letter to Mr. Rolat continued: “I am truly excited that this Museum honoring the great role of Jews in Polish history and culture is being built. I believe your efforts and those of your colleagues in Warsaw will preserve and illuminate the beautiful, complex and tragic story of the Jews in Poland. Thank you.”

The North American Council and the Museum are grateful for Mr. Kusmierczak’s generous donation. A plaque honoring his parents will be placed in the new museum building.

Strong Stance Against Antisemitism in Poland

NAC Chairman thanks Polish officials for speaking out against antisemitism and ethnic hatred

The North American Council for the Museum of the History of Polish Jews applauds the efforts of the Polish government to track down and punish those who desecrated the Jewish memorial in Jedwabne, as well as others who have committed hate crimes in Poland. The stone monument in Jedwabne, a village about 100 miles north of Warsaw, commemorates the July 1941 mass murder of Jews by the local population.

“We appreciate the remarks by Polish President Bronislaw Komorowski and Foreign Minister Radoslaw Sikorski, who in no uncertain terms condemned the actions of those who vandalized this Holocaust memorial, dedicated to the Jews who were murdered by their Polish neighbors during World War II,” said NAC chairman Sigmund Rolat during his recent visit to Poland.

“We are also grateful to Mayor Tadeusz Truskolaski of nearby Bialystok, and other Polish leaders who led townspeople in a protest march against such hateful acts and racism. The obscene statements scrawled on the walls of this important memorial do not reflect the increasingly positive relationship between the Jewish people and the people of Poland, and seems to be an attempt by some to undermine this growing rapport between our peoples.”

Mr. Rolat noted that the Internal Security Agency (ABW) has joined the search for those who committed this crime, and who may have committed other crimes in the Podlasie region of north-eastern Poland, including the defacement of a synagogue in Orla, the attempt to burn down the home of a Polish-Pakistani couple, and attacks against Lithuanians.

“The fact that the ABW has been called in shows that the Polish government is taking this matter very, very, seriously, and that they will not tolerate this racist behavior against Jews or other Polish minorities.”

The North American Council of the Museum of the History of Polish Jews supports the joint efforts of the Polish government and private citizens to build the museum on the site where the Warsaw Ghetto once stood. Using the latest historical research and innovative exhibition design, the museum will immerse visitors in the 1000-year-old world of Polish Jews and encourage exploration through a wide range of media, documents, and artifacts. As a cultural and educational center, the Museum will provide a unique learning environment, lively public programs, and singular meeting place for a diverse public.

President Obama Visits the Museum Site

From combined services:—When President Barack Obama made his official visit to Poland on a cool, rainy day in mid-Spring, he made a special effort to recognize Polish-Jewish leadership, Holocaust survivors and Righteous Gentiles, as well as Polish government leaders. His mission was to improve relations with a country that is playing an increasingly important role in the European Union and is one of Israel's strongest supporters. His goal was to emphasize how the Polish nation’s experience with democracy can offer lessons to those seeking freedoms across North Africa and the Middle East.

One of his first stops on May 27, 2011, was Ghetto Heroes' Square in Warsaw, where he laid a wreath at the Ghetto Fighters’ Monument and then crossed the square to visit the construction site of the Museum of the History of Polish Jews. It is being built opposite the Monument in the heart of what once was the Warsaw Ghetto, and is scheduled to open on April 19, 2013, on the anniversary of the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising.

Mr. Obama was greeted by the Chief Rabbi of Poland, Michael Schudrich, who introduced Wladyslaw Bartoszewski, a member of the cabinet and former minister of foreign affairs, an Auschwitz survivor, and one of the Righteous Among the Nations who saved Jews during the Holocaust. The President was also greeted by the Minister of Culture and National Heritage Bogdan Zdrojewski, Warsaw Mayor, President Hanna Gronkiewicz-Waltz, Marian Turski, Chairman of the Museum Council and Deputy Chairman of the Jewish Historical Institute, Piotr Kadlcik, the leader of Jewish Communities in Poland, and Agnieszka Rudzinska, Acting Director of the Museum of the History of Polish Jews. Others in attendance were Anna Stupnicka-Bando, Chair of the Polish Society of Righteous Among the Nations, Józef Walaszczyk, Vice-Chairman of the Polish Society of the Righteous Among the Nations, and Piotr Wi?licki, Chairman of the Board, Jewish Historical Institute Association. Museum personnel also attended the event.

At the Museum, President Obama received an update from Minister Zdrojewski and Sigmund Rolat, Chairman of the North American Council for the Museum and its major benefactor. Mr. Rolat presented Mr. Obama with a plaque bearing an inscription commemorating his visit. An identical plaque will be mounted on the wall of the Museum building.

Mr. Rolat told the media, “I explained to the President that it will be an exceptional museum. It will not be devoted uniquely to the Holocaust and Jewish martyrdom, but also, at least to the same degree, to the 1000 years of history of joint Polish and Jewish existence in this land.” Mr. Obama invited Mr. Rolat aboard Air Force One for the flight back to America.

Marian Turski, who is a Holocaust survivor, told President Obama that the Museum is being built for the sake of Polish youth, “to make it aware of the loss Poland suffered as a result of the absence of its Jews.” Jewish youth, he said, “would benefit from the awareness of its roots,” and for the people of the world, he said, it would serve to “make them understand how great was the contribution of Polish Jewry to European and world civilization.” The President spent extra time with Mr. Turski, who told him how he had marched with Martin Luther King, Jr. for civil rights in Montgomery, Alabama. Turski related the President's reply: "I thank you because it's thanks to people like you that I was able to become president."

Acting MHPJ Director Agnieszka Rudzinska told the media that “It was an extraordinary encounter. President Obama had more time for us than we had expected, and … wished us successful completion of the Museum construction mission."

Piotr Kadlcik, head of the Union of Jewish Religious Communities in Poland, said, “Despite being such an important and meaningful political figure, President Obama found time to stop for a moment and consider the lessons of history.”

Warsaw Mayor Hanna Gronkiewicz-Waltz told the President, “Construction began just two years ago, although twenty years ago, everyone was already thinking that such a museum should be built." In her conversation with Mr. Obama, she stressed that the Museum documented "the thousand years of Poles and Jews living together, with the Holocaust just one element of that history." Mayor Gronkiewicz-Waltz told the media that President Obama said that he would like to return to Warsaw with his daughters to attend the Museum's opening in 2013. “What a wonderful visit. I’ll have to bring my daughters,” President Obama said as he left the site.

Mr Sigmund Rolat, Chairman of the North American Council of the Museum of the History of Polish Jews, presents U.S. President Barack Obama with a plaque commemorating his visit to the Museum's construction site on May 25, 2011. From left to right: Mr. Sigmund Rolat, Warsaw Mayor Hanna Gronkiewicz-Waltz, President Obama and Marian Turski, Chairman of the Museum Council in Poland and Deputy Chairman of the Jewish Historical Institute in Warsaw.

This plaque was presented to President Obama. A duplicate will be mounted on the Museum's wall.

From left to right: Museum Council Chairman and Deputy Director of the Jewish Historical Institute Marian Turski; Acting Museum Director, Agnieszka Rudzinska; Mr. Sigmund Rolat, Chairman of the North American Council of the Museum of the History of Polish Jews; Warsaw Mayor (President) Hanna Gronkiewicz-Waltz; U.S. President Barack Obama, and Minister of Culture and National Heritage Bogdan Zdrojewski

Sigmund Rolat Receives Guardian of Memory Award

The 8th Annual I. B. Singer Festival opened on Sunday, August 28, with a moving ceremony and a gala concert in Warsaw. The director of the festival and head of Shalom Foundation, Golda Tencer, presented coveted “Guardians of Memory” awards to Polish dignitaries and honored guests. The recipients were the President (Mayor) of the city of Warsaw, Hanna Gronkiewicz-Waltz; Minister of Culture and National Heritage Bogdan Zdrojewski; Plenipotentiary for International Dialogue and Chairman of the Council for the Protection of the Memory of Struggle and Martyrdom, Minister Wladyslaw Bartoszewski, and Sigmund Rolat, president of the American Friends of the Shalom Foundation and Chairman of the North American Council for the Museum of the History of Polish Jews.

Mr. Rolat talked about the importance of memory and told the crowd in the packed synagogue that he was grateful to those in Poland, especially the government officials who shared the award with him, for keeping the flame of Jewish tradition alive in Poland. “It is not only a duty and a privilege to maintain our memory. It is also rewarding and at times inspiring. For truly today in Poland, especially among the young, people are very, very interested in the history, the customs, and the culture of their once ubiquitous Jewish neighbors. I see it. I feel it. … L’dor V’dor, from my generation, to future generations, I pledge to continue my quest for memory and a bright future.”

Among the attending dignitaries were U.S. Ambassador Lee Feinstein, Israeli Ambassador to Poland Zvi Rav-Ner, Former Knesset Speaker and Israeli Ambassador to Poland, Shevach Weiss, leaders of the Warsaw Jewish community, and a standing room only international crowd in the Nozyk Synagogue on Twarda Street. They were eager to hear acclaimed Cantor Joseph Malovany of New York’s Fifth Avenue Synagogue, whose spinto tenor voice earned him the title, “Pavarotti of the Synagogue.” He was accompanied by the choir from Wroclaw’s White Stork Synagogue, directed by Stanislaw Rybarczyk.

The cantor explained his choice of melodies: used in the High Holy Day liturgy, they were written in Warsaw before the Holocaust and have likely not been heard in a synagogue in Warsaw in 70 years. He talked about Polish-born Moshe Koussevitzky, the cantor in the Great Synagogue in Warsaw before the war, who was considered one of the greatest cantors of all time. “The Singer Festival,” he said, “offers a welcome venue for them to be performed once again.”

U.S. Ambassador Feinstein noted that “Among American Jews, there is new interest in their Polish roots. And they are increasingly interested in how Jews lived in Poland; they are simply interested in Poland… This festival reminds us that we are all cousins.”

Organized annually by the Shalom Foundation, this year's festival featured outstanding performances by Americans. Frank London's klezmer opera, based on the novel "A Night in the Old Marketplace," received accolades (get a taste HERE, as did the Ger Mandolin Orchestra from San Francisco, and Troyke from Berlin. (Click HERE to catch an earful.)

Mr. Sigmund Rolat, Chairman of the North American Council of the Museum of the History of Polish Jews, and chairman of the American Friends of the Shalom Foundation, receives the Guardians of Memory Award from Mrs. Golda Tencer, Director General of the Shalom Foundation and the I.B. Singer Festival in Warsaw.

Mr. Rolat addresses the audience in the Nozyk Synagogue in Warsaw.

Cantor Joseph Malovany, of New York's Fifth Avenue Synagogue, performs liturgical music to an overflow crowd at the opening ceremonies of the I.B. Singer Festival at the Nozyk Synagogue in Warsaw.

Acceptance Speech for Guardians of Memory Award by Sigmund Rolat

I am greatly honored to receive this distinction with Chairman of the Council for the Protection of the Memory of Struggle and Martyrdom Wladyslaw Bartoszewski; Minister of Culture and National Heritage Bogdan Zdrojewski, and Warsaw President Hanna Gronkiewicz-Waltz. Minister Bartoszewski, of course, is very embodiment, the incarnation, of this very title. His life and career define it. President Gronkiewicz-Waltz and Minister Zdrojewski on behalf of the Polish government, carry on—in their multiple responsibilities—the flame of Jewish tradition, of which the best example is Ms. Golda Tencer’s Isaac Bashevis Singer Festival.

For me, especially important, is their role in our new Museum of the History of Polish Jews. It is they who are building our magnificent Museum, the only such Museum in the world, which will show the thousand-year-old history of Polish Jews—all its accomplishments, the entire panoply—the great accomplishments, the final tragedy, and now the budding renaissance.

Straznikom Pamieci Tym Którzy Ja Ocalili

Guardians of Memory: To those who save it, L’Dor V’dor, from generation to generation. I personally accept this prize with thanks and as a reminder—in a way, a duty.

I shall always remember the last time I saw my oldest brother Jerzyk. Just after the liquidation of the Czestochowa ghetto, he visited me in a children's hiding place. He was leaving with a group of young Jewish partisans to fight the Germans. His last words to me were, “You must remember. You must remember all that you see around you—all that happened here. YOU MUST REMEMBER.”

A few weeks later, Jerzyk was shot dead with five other partisans. He was the youngest. He was 18 years old.

It is not only a duty and a privilege to maintain our memory. It is also rewarding and at times inspiring. For truly today in Poland, especially among the young, people are very, very interested in the history, the customs, and the culture of their once ubiquitous Jewish neighbors. I see it. I feel it. I enjoy it here, in Krakow, in my native Czestochowa.

L’dor V’dor, from my generation, to future generations, I pledge to continue my quest for memory and a bright future.

Reconstructing History: The Gwozdziec Synagogue Roof

The Museum of the History of Polish Jews, with Handshouse Studio and the Timber Framers’ Guild in Sanok, Poland, is building a replica of the timber framed roof and polychrome ceiling of an exceptional 17th-century wooden synagogue that once stood in the Polish shtetl of Gwozdziec. The reconstruction, at 85% scale, will form the centerpiece of “Into the Country”— a gallery in the permanent exhibition devoted to the 17th and 18th century.

The concept came from Michael Berkowicz, Board member of the North American Council of the Museum and the principal of Berkowicz Design, who specializes in creating sanctuaries in modern synagogues. He realized the potential of this approach and its educational value and introduced Barbara Kirshenblatt-Gimblett, leader of the Museum’s exhibition development team, to the people at Handshouse Studios. The idea was enthusiastically embraced.

The hand-crafted pieces will be seen from a grand public space in the Museum. When looking up from the Core Exhibition, visitors will see the polychrome ceiling, and visitors in the grand public space will see the intricate timber frame structure through a cutout in the roof.

The Gwozdziec Synagogue, built in 1700-1731, was destroyed by the Nazis during the Holocaust, along with 200 other wooden synagogues. It was located in the then-Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, in a town now named Hvozdets’ in the Ukraine. Thomas C. Hubka, an architectural historian, described the synagogue as “a truly resplendent synagogue that exemplified a high point in Jewish architectural art and religious painting, a tradition that was later abandoned by Eastern-European Jewish communities in the 19th and 20th centuries.”

Researchers found comprehensive documentation to support every detail of reconstruction. The international team of more than 100 people working on the structure consists of historians, architects, artists, students and artisans using traditional tools, techniques, and materials. Eight wooden panels were produced in Sanok in southern Poland in the summer 2011. Patterns from the existing documents were magnified and transferred to the panels, which were painted with rabbit-glue pigments. More than 50 people painted three of the panels, which were lined with rabbit skin glue and special gesso. The next series of five panels will be completed by new teams in the summer of 2012.

For those participating in the project, there were tours, seminars and workshops on myriad topics, including paper-cuts, synagogue architecture and its variations, urban architecture, Jewish art, culture and traditions. Participants also visited Wroclaw and Krakow, two cities with a long history of established Jewish communities, and traveled to several sites where traditional wooden synagogues once stood. They also took part in March of the Living in Rzeszow, the regional capital near Sanok.

According to Handshouse Studios, the plan is “to actually build the structure, in parts, in empty synagogues in eight different locations in Poland and then to bring the parts to Warsaw for final assembly. We will encourage participation of local townspeople, with the goal of stimulating local interest in the Jewish past of these towns, connecting Jews around the world who descend from those places with those living there today, and fostering collaborative efforts to preserve the memory of Jewish life in Poland.”

The Handshouse mission is to have people "learn by building—to demonstrate the power of architecture to build community and foster historical awareness and appreciation.”

Other articles of interest:

Several photographs of the work on the roof and interesting explanation of the process of reconstruction can be seen HERE.

Exterior photo of the Gwozdziec Synagogue. Its polychromed interior dome and roof are being replicated for the Museum's grand public space and permanent exhibition.

Program participants pose with their handiwork. The panel was painted with rabbit-glue-based pigments.

Wide shot of the building site in Sanok, where logs were hand-hewn and the traditional process of building wooden synagogues was closely followed.

The Virtual Shtetl Gets an App

The Virtual Shtetl, an online project of the Museum of the History of Polish Jews in Warsaw, puts the concept of "a museum without walls" into practice by using innovative new technologies to bring history to a contemporary audience.

The Virtual Shtetl website is a unique social network that allows history buffs and Polish-Jewish culture enthusiasts to share, exchange and find information; upload photos, collect memorabilia, listen to testimonies, and much more. So far, the Virtual Shtetl community has collected information on more than 200 towns, gathered over 60,000 photographs, and assembled more than 1000 video clips and audio testimonies.

The Virtual Shtetl is easy for users to access from anywhere. The Virtual Shtetl App, available in Polish, English, German and Hebrew, was recently launched so that smartphone users can access content wherever they are. The application offers information and photographs of the most important Jewish sites and landmarks. Maps and GPS coordinates facilitate the search for Jewish monuments; current news and tidbits from the Polish-Jewish world are offered, straight off the website. A “Shtetl” dictionary makes it easy to look up key words.